The Leadership Team You Need to Build Before Your Company Can Scale | Between The Builds

Chris Fay: Welcome to Built with Purpose. I am Chris Fay, and this is the show where vision meets execution and leadership leaves a legacy. From design studios to innovation hubs and product lines to skylines. We need the people building more than great companies. They're creating culture, driving impact, and shaping what's next. These are the stories and strategies behind how the world gets built with purpose. All right, everybody, welcome to Built with Purpose. ⁓ today is another episode of Between the Builds. I'm your host, Chris Fay. ⁓ if you've been listening for some time, you know we've had some amazing conversations. Between the builds is always a really cool opportunity for us to Listen back and think back on our previous guests. And we had a really cool conversation last week with Mark Moses. You know, he leads a company called CEO Coaching International. They work with some of the largest businesses helping coach the CEOs and executive teams. Had a really awesome conversation with Mark. ⁓ what's actually interesting is that I'm actually a customer of Mark's company. So my CEO coach is ⁓ is a member of Mark's team, has been wildly impactful for me to come in. ⁓ really from the outside, giving me an outsider's perspective of some of the moves that we're making in the business. So, first off, just a quick plug to ⁓ to Mark and his team ⁓ over there. If you are a CEO ⁓ looking to shepherd your company into the future, if you are looking to grow an organization, especially taking exponential steps in where you're heading, ⁓ you need to go talk to Mark and his team at CEO coaching. They are an awesome, awesome ⁓ group of individuals. But you know, it's funny, I I was as I was going through the conversation with Mark last week. We were talking about, you know, why why companies don't grow? You know, w what what are some of the things that get in the way of growth as it relates to to these executives? And and and it was funny, when I asked him this question, it was very clear to me what his response was going to be. But I was so curious to hear him hear him validate that. And I you know, Mark, what's what's like the one thing? Like what's the number one thing that most CEOs have a problem doing, or what gets in the way of of growth? Is it Vision, as a messaging, as a financing, whatever. And he's like, it's not having the right people. It it he's like out of, I think he said a hundred and something ⁓ companies that they've worked with and however many billions of dollars of revenue, it all comes back to having the right people in the right seats on the bus. And especially in the executive leadership team, Mark was talking about the the common thing that he's seen as companies begin to accelerate growth is that the leadership team that got you to one point. might not be the leadership team that's going to get you to the next point or far into the future. Now it's not to it's not to say that people can't grow and you can't develop individuals. That's absolutely one of the options. But if you are a leader and trying to grow something to the next level, whether it's a team, whether it's a church, an organization, or a business, you have a situation where you need to rely on a group of individuals to sh to help shepherd your growth forward. You cannot do it yourself. And so having the right people on your team that are able to execute at the level that needs to be is the single most important thing that Mark taught us we need to be thinking about inside of our companies and our businesses. So just thinking about what that what does that mean? And and I can just tell you, going through ⁓ a lot of the change that we're going through in our organization, you know, we're going through mergers and acquisitions, we're we're pivoting our structure and we're pivoting kind of our vision of where we're taking the company. You know, we've got we've got teams that are ⁓ exiting the businesses and teams that are coming into the businesses, and we're laying out this really vision about where we're going in the future. And we are dead, hot and heavy in the middle of a re-org as we speak. So, you know, Mark's messaging just resonated with me so clearly because I am I am personally, you know, dead in the middle of it. And it's hard. You know, it's hard. As humans, we're conditioned to to to care for one another, right? To to want what's best for everybody that's on the team. You know, we we tend to we tend to be people pleasers. Now I know there's some of you out there might not be people pleasers, but in general, we want to make ⁓ you know other people happy. We wanna do things that are gonna support ⁓ their growth. And and so oftentimes when you think about having a leader that might not be the right person, it's hard. That's a hard conversation. And oftentimes we'll find ourselves shying away from that conversation because we don't want to hurt that individual's feelings. You know, we we worry about what that might look like ⁓ inside of the organization, what the perception might be. You know, we we worry about if that person leaves, am I gonna be able to find somebody that that has the institutional knowledge or or is as good or better? Those are all the fears that cycle through our minds. But what Mark taught us last week is that you have to make these decisions. This is the single most important thing to making sure that you're you're growing your teams and growing your companies. And what's actually fair, if you think about what's fair and treating people and putting them in a ⁓ situation where they can grow and succeed, whether it's inside of your company or outside of your company, is at the end of the day the very best thing that you can do for them. Keeping somebody in a role that they may or may not be ⁓ successful in, they might not be personally satisfied, is actually a disservice not only to you and the company, but also to them. So I what I want to kind of talk a little bit about today is how do you deal with this change? How d how do you deal with this inside of your company, inside of your business, inside of your team? And how do you make sure it's you're putting the right people in the right seats and you're getting them to that next level? So a couple of things that I that I've done in the past and have worked and have worked on. First off, you gotta be really clear on where you're going, right? And that was something Mark Mark talked about last week. You you gotta understand where you where you wanna take the business. And so let's say you're a $10 million business today and you want to get to a $50 million business. Okay, well, cool. What what does your leadership team need to look like as a $50 million your business? Okay, so if I establish a vision, where are we going? What does my team need to look like? Take all the names out of there. So the best thing to do is take all of your existing names out and build an organizational structure for the vision of your of your company. Whether it's a year from now, two years from now, three years from now, what does the ideal, ideal organizational structure look like to achieve your vision? And I can tell you, you know, you know I'm a big AI person. I talk to Claude and and ⁓ you know my AI tools a lot. So I always ask Claude to help me with this. Hey, I'm trying to take this business to this unit. Can you please go do research for me? Help me understand what my organizational structure needs to look like at that vision. Help me understand what roles I'm going to need. And then very specifically help me understand what is a job description and what do each of those roles need to possess? What would the ideal leader look like in each of those particular roles? Okay. So in this instance, you haven't worried about hurting anybody's feelings. This is work that you can do on your own or even with your leadership team. Just help me understand what this is going to look like in the future. And then once you have a very clear idea of what the leadership team is going to look like in the future. And what each of those leaders needs to be capable of doing, you could write a very clear job description of what your chief revenue officer needs to look like, what your VP of engineering needs to look like, what your chief financial officer needs to look like. Once you have that job description and you have that vision, all you're now doing is basically reverse engineering where you are today to where you want to go. So let's let's take a quick example. Let's talk about like a VP of sales, for instance. Let's say you're a small organization today. You don't have a VP of sales. ⁓ you've got maybe a sales director, or maybe you're leading sales yourself because you're in a smaller business, but you know, as you 2x and 3x your organization, you're gonna likely need a vice president of sales. Perfect. Let's let's workshop through what that vice president of sales, all right. Well, gosh, at that size company, like, you know, I want somebody that ⁓ that understands how to run teams of this size. They've got to be able to forecast. I need to make sure they they know our systems. I really want this individual to have that industry knowledge. All the things. All right, perfect. Now I have a vision of what my VP of sales role needs to look like, you know, over the next couple years. Now, what do I need to do to get from point A where I am today to point B? Well, I've got a sales director or a sales director or two that are in my organization today. I know that in two to three years, I'm going to need a VP of sales that's going to come in and actually do these elevated duties that are inside of the business. very core common question. Can the individual that I have today grow and scale to achieve what is possible? If I surround that person with coaching, if I surround that person with development, if I put them into experiences that will help shepherd them towards that ideal ⁓ candidate goal, then perfect. I'm able to invest in my ⁓ existing team. What I can also do is I can meet with that director and I can say, look, in two years, I'm going to need a VP of sales. This is exactly what that that job description is going to look like. I believe that you have the ⁓ opportunity, if you want to, to pursue growth to be that person. Do you do you want to go that way? Yes or no? If the answer is yes, sweet. What do what do you see as the gaps between where you are today and what I'm going to need in the future? And then let's together put a development roadmap together to make sure that you are ready to get from point A to where we're going in point B. But what you need to also ⁓ understand as a leader is you might look at the person you need in the future and you might look at the person that you have today and you say there is no way in hell that person will ever become ⁓ the individual that I'm going to need. Okay, now you know the answer. So now you know that you have to ⁓ you have to deal with a current ⁓ current leader that's in the business and you need to find a an appropriate way to shepherd them either ⁓ out or potentially into a different role. And you now know that you're gonna have to go outside to hire that executive level level leader that you're gonna be looking to. So that's great. That those are the facts. And now it's just a simple conversation to meet with that existing leader to say, look, this is the type of individual I'm gonna need ⁓ or our business is going to need, you know, in the next in the next two years. I've I I really have some concerns on on if you're if you're the person. I don't think you possess the experience or the expertise to potentially get there. I love you, I'd like to have you on the team. What do you see this looking like? Do you do you feel like you possess ⁓ the experiences to get there? Yes or no? If the answer is no, okay, well then this is what we're going to do. What what would make the most sense for you, Mr. or Mrs. Sales Director? ⁓ you know, we're not gonna need this role maybe for another six to twelve months. You know, do you wanna fall back into maybe an individual contributor role? Do you wanna maybe think about ⁓ maybe we work together on a strategic exit where you can actually go find something that's gonna be more suited to your your needs? Or is there a sales director role and you're just gonna be working underneath this potential vice president? So it's all about having an open, honest dialogue with those individuals. But you can't have that open, honest dialogue if you don't have the vision and if you don't have that future org structure in place. I see so many times people go in and they s they sit down and they talk to one of their leaders like, hey, we're gonna be growing the business. I'm gonna need you to do these things into the future. All right, go go do them. And then they exp they're expecting this individual to chase something that is undefined, and they're expecting somebody that they might not even know is qualified to execute on a much higher level of work. So vision, ideal org structure, job descriptions for each of those. Map that individual ⁓ role with the people that you have on the team today. Answer for yourself: can that person get to that point? If the answer is yes. You have a dialogue with that individual to see if they're interested and what help and coaching they're going to need to get them from point A to point B. If you if the answer is no, if that individual is not going to be the right person, you still have an open, honest dialogue with that person and you tell them for these various reasons, this is why I don't believe that you are the ideal candidate for this role. But I I love you and I care for you and you've done an amazing ⁓ work. I want to make sure that you are landing on your feet, whether it's inside of our organization or somebody else's. And we're gonna together workshop on what a potential path looks like. That is the best way to handle these things. And if you do that, if for each of your executive leadership roles and each of your leadership team, you have a clear path of how to get your current team either up or out and new talent into the business, then it's just a matter of pure execution. So that helps you take a bit of the emotions out of this. You just gotta be open and honest. And you gotta do it based upon facts. Job descriptions, planning, and sit down. People want to be honest. They want to know where they're heading, how their career can progress. And if you hide that information for them, or if you put them in a position to not be successful, you're actually doing them a disservice as well as your organization. So I could talk about this for hours. I love this topic around really opening up dialogue with teams, helping grow and develop folks. Maybe we'll talk a little bit more about this on a future between the builds, but your action today, if you were to leave here this week and with this with this message in mind, your one thing to think about. Where are you heading as an organization or as a team or as a group? What is the leadership? What does your leadership team need to look like in order to support that growth? And then very clearly, do you have the people that are on the team that are going to get you from point A to point B? And if not, what is your action? Are you going to develop those individuals or are you going to move them potentially out or over in the business and hire? Those are all very tactical things that you can do without having to talk to anybody and just brainstorming. So that's the one thing that you need to do this week is to have a very clear idea of what your leadership structure will look like. Please feel free to message me. We'd love to have conversations. I love hearing comments from you all on some of these topics. ⁓ we got some pretty exciting guests coming around the corner. We got some longevity conversations, a little bit more technology conversations, industry dialogues, and ⁓ and with that I hope you all have an amazing day. See ya. Okay, thanks for joining me on Built with Purpose. If you have enjoyed today's episode, subscribe, share, and leave us a review. It helps more bold leaders find the show. For resources and show notes, visit our website and connect with me, Chris Fay, on LinkedIn. Until next time, keep building great companies, cultures, and legacies with ERCS.